MALIK, CJ. :- This is an application on behalf of two young women, Allah Bandi, aged 20 years, and Khatoon, aged 16 years, under Art. 226 of the Constitution that they were being illegally deported to Pakistan.

2. The facts of the case now more or less admitted by counsel and established from the affidavits are that Allah Bandi was the daughter of one Abdul Latif, resident of village Gonchi in the district of Gurgaon, and Khatoon was the daughter of Shafi Mohammad, brother of Abdul Latif, of the same village. These two girls were married, while minors, to two persons of Usmanpur, district Bulandshahr. Allah Bandi was married to Abdul Sattar and Khatoon was married to Abdul Jabbar.

In the year 1947 Abdul Latif and Shafi Mohammad left for Pakistan and they have settled there. At that time Allah Bandi and Khatoon were both minors, being aged 16 years and 12 years respectively. When their parents left for Pakistan they were with their parents and left with them. They were, however anxious to come back to India. In 1950 they returned to India on a permanent permit issued by the High Commissioner for India in Pakistan. This permit had, however, been obtained on the basis of a statement that they had migrated to Pakistan during the period between the 1st of February and 31-5-1950.

There had been an agreement between the two countries which provided that all those who had migrated from one country to another between those dates were entitled to come back to their original homes and re-settle there. The permanent permit, however, was cancelled on 20-12-1950, as it was found that Allah Bandi and Khatoon had migrated to Pakistan in 1947 and not between 1st February and 31-5-1950. On behalf of the State Government reliance was placed on an earlier application dated 21-9-1949.

On 21-9-1949, Biland Khan, brother-in-law of Allah Bandi and Khatoon, had made an application for a permanent permit to return to India and in the list of relations who were to accompany him he had included the names of Allah Bandi and Khatoon, his sisters-in-law. The application for a permanent permit for re-settlement was on a printed form which was to be filled in by Pakistan residents who had migrated from India since 1-3-1947. Reliance was placed on this application and it was asserted that the petitioners had left for Pakistan in 1947 and the permanent permit issued in 1950, having been obtained on a false statement of fact, was rightly cancelled.

3. Two points have been urged in this connection : whether a permanent permit issued for resettlement in India in accordance with the provisions of Art. 7 of the Constitution can be cancelled by the authorities issuing the same on the ground that the permanent permit had been obtained by fraud. The other point raised is that the petitioners cannot be said to have migrated to Pakistan as both were minors and were, therefore, incapable in law of exercising their volition of leaving the country of their origin with the intention of resettling elsewhere. In other words, that a minor cannot during the continuance of his minority be deemed in law to have a mind of his own which he can exercise for himself and decide whether he will change his place of domicile and adopt another and that their husbands alone, they being married, could act as their guardian.

4. It is not necessary in this case to consider the first point as no arguments have been advanced by learned counsel in support of the proposition coming to the next point, it is not denied that the two petitioners were married before they left India for Pakistan. Under S. 16, Indian Succession Act (Act 39 of 1925) their domicile must be deemed to be the domicile of their husbands. As a matter of fact they were both Indian citizens by birth also. So long as the marriage subsisted they could not change their domicile at their will and during their minority the only persons who could decides such questions for them were their husbands, who were their legal guardians.

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